Make ice cream in just 5 minutes with this hack

There's an ice cream hack that's perfect for satisfying your sweet tooth in a hurry, and you might have even tried this experiment in elementary school. While making ice cream at home can be time-consuming, with or without an ice cream maker, this time-tested hack only takes five minutes, which means you can be eating almost any flavor of ice cream you want in no time (via Fox News).

The best part about making five-minute ice cream is that you can customize it with any kind of flavors or mix-ins you'd like (and have on hand). Anything from candy pieces and crushed cookies to nuts and mint can be tossed into your mixture. Chocolate chips are a great comforting add-in, but we love the idea of using butterscotch or peanut butter chips. Don't forget brownie bites, cookie dough, or cake bites, either. Your creativity — and pantry — are the only limits to the kind of ice cream you can make in a pinch.

How to make five-minute ice cream

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To make five-minute ice cream, you only need a few ingredients and supplies that you likely already have at home. Ingredients include cream, sugar, vanilla, salt, ice, and two sizes of sealable plastic bags — one large and one smaller. Whatever you want to add in should also be set out on the table.

To start, you'll want to place the ice cream ingredients into the smaller bag (but not the salt or ice). This should include four parts cream to one part sugar, plus a dash of vanilla. You can use light or heavy cream, or even whole milk if need be. Don't forget to toss your mix-ins or other flavors into the bag before sealing it off.

Next, put the smaller bag inside the larger bag. You'll then need to place the ice and salt into the larger bag, arranging it around the smaller bag. While regular kitchen salt can be used, you'll get a better texture of ice cream if you use ice cream salt or rock salt, which works better because it has larger crystals (via The Stay At Home Chef).

At this point, all you have to do is shake the bags for about five minutes. You'll need to shake it well since this is essentially churning the ice cream. Check the ice cream consistency after five minutes. If it isn't as thick as you'd like, then keep going. If it's ready, get a spoon and dig in.